The Indian constitution states that India is a federal, democratic, secular republic. Thats more big words in one sentence that an average Indian can chew. But the fact is that it’s just a bunch of words which means nothing. Like the old saying,

il is in the details, lets look at each of those words from the Indian context.

Democracy
“A system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives.”

Are we a democracy ? Yes we are a democracy, don’t we have the right to choose between the devil and the sea every five years ? Now isnt that power to the people. Rest of the details you don’t need to know and interfere. Just exercise whatever power given to you and shut up. This is exactly Indian democracy.

Is our elected representative really our representative ? Is he free to voice my concern and take sides accordingly ? No !! He is first part of a political party and we have rules to make sure that he stays loyal to the party and not to the people. Party whips and democracy will never go hand in hand.

We have reservation constituencies where only people of a certain catse can stand for elections. Now is that democacy ? Yes if you define it so.

Federal

“Having or relating to a system of government in which several states form a unity but remain independent in internal affairs”.

Every state in a federation should have a lot of freedom, at least in their internal matters. The United States is a federal republic and each state can have a set of completely different rules. The central government primarily gets involved only in defence, finance and foreign policy. But in India almost everything is controlled by the central government. A state can’t even build a small dam in their property with out central permission.

In a true federal system, the boundaries of a state cannot be altered by the central government. In India we changed state boundaries based on language, we even split states to create new ones. A federal system cannot do that.

When the British left the princely states wanted to be independent which inlcuded the Travancore also. But Nehru and Patel threatened the then Diwan Sir CP who came for negotiations even to the extent of bombing with the Indian Air Force. When Travancore joined the union its boundaries were changed which will never happen in a true federal state.

Secular
“Doctrine that rejects religion and religious considerations”

Wow… Stop there. !!
Are you sure ?
Hell ya..
India is not a secualr country. Religion is everything here. Even the blind judiciary discriminates based on religion. Marraige laws, succession laws, reservation etc are purely based on ones religions. Now they are planning to make a law which makes it illegal for you to change your religion.

Its time for a revolution, a revolution against the system by the people. The time is near and thats why we are reading words like “sedition” quite often. The time is near because intellectuals, artists and social activists are being jailed accusing them of working against the state. The only question is how are you participating in the it.